Good Morning, August, from the Book Tuck Everlasting

Hawk’s Bill Crag in the Ozark Mountains In the above photo, you see a view of Hawk’s Bill Crag, which is in the Ozark Mountains. It is 38 miles from my house. While this is not the Alps, the Ozarks is a hilly-to-mountainous region, and in places, the terrain is downright steep. While Hawk’s Bill…

Register Today for the Linda Camacho & Dakotas SCBWI Webinar

Although she has held other positions in the publishing industry, Linda Camacho is currently an agent with Gallt & Zacker Literary Agency. Her Wish List is Published Here: “Linda Camacho, agent with Gallt & Zacker, graduated from Cornell with a B.S. in Communication and has held various positions at Penguin Random House, Dorchester, Simon and…

An August Calendar from Jacki Kellum for You to Print

The long, last blast of summer now, I hear an autumn call. Soft and quiet, like silver thread, Wings come whisper to my bed, And one sole star above my head, Goodnight, Goodbye, my sun. – Jacki Kellum – I know that I am not the only person who is happy to see the summer of…

Frances Gilbert Tweets about the Rule of 3s

“In storytelling, authors often create triplets or structures in three parts.” Wikipedia For instance: Rumpelstiltskin spins thrice for the heroine and lets her guess his name thrice over a period of three days. Wikipedia In Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, Marley’s Ghost tells Ebenezer Scrooge he will receive visits from three spirits: The Ghost of Christmas Past, The Ghost of Christmas Present, and…

Co-Author with Your Elderly Parent: Do Yourself A Favor

“Maybe it’s true that life begins at fifty. But everything else starts to wear out, fall out, or spread out.” ― Phyllis Diller My mother is 93 years old and she lives over 181 miles away from me. To make matters worse, the gap between the two of us is crooked, mountainous, and a slow-go, but…

What Is A Chapter Book? How Is It Different Than a Middle Grade Novel?

Once a child graduates from picture books, there are several more steps before he is ready to read adult novels. I’ll talk about step readers and graphic novels in other posts, but today, I want to focus on both chapter books and middle grade novels. Chapter books are shorter than middle grade novels. Some of…